Just made the jump into night vision with L3 WP PVS-14 on a TW Exfil SF w/G24 mount and I’m loving it. Doing stuff around the house and walking the dog got a whole lot more fun.

Anyway, I went to try passive aiming with my ACOG + RCR and smacked the tube into the back of the ACOG. Extended the stock a few notches and now my tube is looking off to the right of the optic and not through it. Tried pulling my face more upright and squared up to the target but now I’m looking over the top of the optic and I have zero chinweld. Brought the rifle up so only the toe of the stock is in my shoulder and now I’m whacking the tube off the ACOG and my headset is smacking the stock. Finally tried fully extending the stock which is really uncomfortable for my support arm which stops my tube from hitting the ACOG but I barely have a chinweld.

Am I doing something wrong with my stance or tube position? I normally shoot slightly bladed which feels good for recoil control and stops my headset from hitting the stock. I have the tube positioned in the top third of my vision and level with the ground with the eyepiece about 2 inches from my eye. Maybe I just need to get a dedicated NV optic, but I’ve heard for a while that a piggyback red dot on an ACOG is a great setup for this stuff.

Thanks everyone, looking forward to your tips and tricks.

Acog isn't the most convenient optic to shoot like that. But it can work.

No matter what, you're going to want to be squared off to the target and with the super high piggy back red dot you wouldn't really be getting much more than bare chinweld anyway.

With my acog setups, when shooting passively, i pull the stock out almost all the way so i don't hit my nods. I don't have great chinweld either but it's enough to get hits on steel at reasonable distances from shooting a really high red dot through nods. Say out to 100.

In the army, as a gunner i had an acog on a saw which was sometimes mounted on the humvee. I found that using my non firing hand to hold my pvs 14 up to the back of the acog let me shoot passively with a lot more accuracy than walking the fire in with tracers or trying to keep the laser from bobbing all over the place. It's not the "right" way but it worked for me.

Hello Daggertt,

Thank you for the information. It sounds like my experience is similar to yours, and that I might have had unrealistic expectations going into this. Would you say that a dedicated NV height optic will be faster and/or more comfortable than my current setup? I have a spare CompM5 laying around that I could put on an ADM NV mount if necessary.

On a somewhat related note, when you shoot with an active laser do you use a chinweld or just float the rifle from the shoulder?

When I'm aiming with the laser I just point shoot.
I'm running an acog with piggyback rmr and I ended switching my mount to a larue qd mount.
It's a little lower than the factory acog mount and allows me to get a little better chinweld.
After that it was just reps that got me in the rmr eyebox consistently.  If you can take a nightvision class, it really helped me.

Adjust your stance to square up more, and tweak your stock length for a better cheek weld. Dedicated NV optics could solve your alignment issues, but piggybacking red dots on ACOGs can work well too.

First, no cheekweld for a red dot mounted on top of an ACOG is normal. If you want a cheekweld then you'll need a lower red dot. A Unity 2.26" mount for your Aimpoint M5 would work well.

Second, you have to shoot more squared up when aiming passively through NV so that your eye can align with the red dot through the tube. There's a little bit of wiggle room but not enough for a heavily bladed stance. Squaring your hips to the target and bringing the stock inboard a little will help get everything lined up. Do not put the toe of the stock at the top of the shoulder; just shrug your shoulder up to raise the optic to your eye-line.

You can also can't the weapon inward a little bit if you need to.

This isn't an ACOG, but this is an example of the position you should be shooting from if you're trying to shoot passively. Squared off, standing up straight, heads up, both eyes open, bring the gun up to your NODS, don't try to scrunch down behind it. Honestly, it's a great cqb shooting stance as well, and it's why the NV height mounts are popular even outside of passive aiming.

I’m near Gunsite and I’ve been recommended their NV classes, but they’re like $1300 and I’m trying to get a laser while recovering from the initial NV purchase haha. By point shoot do you mean you don’t get a cheek/chin weld on the stock?


Okay I see what you mean. I think my issue is that when I use a stance like that my tube hits the back of the ACOG. Maybe it’s just something I should get train around and get used to.

Sorry, I’m a bit slow – could you elaborate on what turkey necking is?

I'm sure Robert is talking about stretching your neck out more. When passively aiming you will be holding your rifle awkwardly due to trying to get your eye, NOD and optic all trying to line up. Higher mounts tend to work better, but suck for anything else then upright shooting. With an extended mount try to shoot from the prone and you will find the true meaning of " Turkey Necking"